Read the following information about famous moments in history. Then choose the correct form. Only one verb in each paragraph is past perfect. A) Columbus left Spain in August 1492 with three ships, to try and find a way to India by sailing west instead of east. When his ships a) finally reached / had reached land on 12 October, he thought he was there, but the ships b) arrived / had actually arrived in America instead.
B) Captain Robert Scott wanted to reach the South Pole first. He and his companions finally arrived there on 1 January 1912 after a terrible journey across the ice, but c) found / had found a Norwegian flag. Unfortunately for Scott, Roald Amundsen d) got / had got there on 14 December, 18 days earlier.
C) Leonardo painted his famous The Last Supper between 1495 and 1498, but the painting started to deteriorate within 50 years. The most common explanation for this used to be that Leonardo e) used / had used the wrong kind of paint, but experts have always disagreed about this, and many believe that the damp in the wall is the cause of the damage. Between 1978 and 1999, experts f) restored / had restored the painting, and the public can now see it again.
In this paragraph, we are talking about an event that happened in the past before another event also in the past. Columbus left Spain in August 1492 and his ships arrived in America on 12 October. The verb "reached" is in the simple past tense because it refers to a specific point in time, October 12th. However, the verb "had reached" is in the past perfect tense because it refers to an action that happened before the simple past event. So the correct form is "had reached."
B) Captain Robert Scott wanted to reach the South Pole first. He and his companions finally arrived there on 1 January 1912 after a terrible journey across the ice, but they found a Norwegian flag. Unfortunately for Scott, Roald Amundsen had got there on 14 December, 18 days earlier.
In this paragraph, we again have two past events. Captain Robert Scott and his companions arrived at the South Pole on 1 January 1912, and they found a Norwegian flag there. However, Roald Amundsen had already reached the South Pole on 14 December, before Scott's arrival. The verb "arrived" and "found" are in the simple past tense because they refer to specific points in time, 1 January and before that. The verb "had got" is in the past perfect tense because it refers to an action that happened before the simple past event of Scott's arrival. So the correct form is "had got."
C) Leonardo painted his famous The Last Supper between 1495 and 1498, but the painting started to deteriorate within 50 years. The most common explanation for this used to be that Leonardo used the wrong kind of paint, but experts have always disagreed about this, and many believe that the damp in the wall is the cause of the damage. Between 1978 and 1999, experts restored the painting, and the public can now see it again.
In this paragraph, we have a series of events that happened in the past. Leonardo painted The Last Supper between 1495 and 1498, and the painting started to deteriorate within 50 years. The verb "painted" and "started" are in the simple past tense because they refer to specific points in time. The verb "used" is also in the simple past tense because it refers to Leonardo's action during the time of painting. However, the verb "had used" is in the past perfect tense because it refers to an action that happened before the simple past events. The verb "have restored" is in the present perfect tense because it indicates an action that started in the past and still has relevance in the present. So the correct form is "had used" for the past perfect tense, and "have restored" for the present perfect tense.